Firefighters celebrated the opening of their new station at 220 West St. yesterday and said a bittersweet farewell to their 1939-vintage quarters on East Street.

“There are some good memories there,” retired firefighter Donald Demers said. “Some bad memories, too, but some really good memories.”

Perhaps the most popular aspect of the new station is the enormous apparatus bay, said Call Fire Department Capt. Kathleen Coulombe, whose husband is the Ware Fire Department chief.

“It was just too crowded,” she said of the former station. “This is so much better, and so much safer.”

The old station had many faults: water and electrical problems, and lack of space that required firefighters to block Routes 9 and 32 when they needed to move trucks and ambulances around.

The new station was not easy to get. The Fire Department has been trying to upgrade for more than a decade and Chief Thomas W. Coulombe said he was told back when the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds became available a few years ago that he should not apply.

The then-town manager told him that even if the town got some of the $210 million, a long shot, voters wouldn't want to provide the matching funds which would be about $2 million.

“I was just thinking we ought to do it so nobody could say, 'Hey did you apply for that grant?' and I'd have to answer no and end up getting my butt kicked for not applying for the grant,” he said.

The chief was still stewing over the town's decision not to apply a few weeks later when he asked his wife one evening if she might have time to write the narrative for the grant while he took care of the other requirements. The application was due in two days.

The next day, he found she'd written an impressive application seeking $5 million for a new station and, after deciding he'd rather ask for forgiveness than permission, they hit the send button, figured that as good as it was, they had no chance, and waited.

In the Statehouse, Sen. Stephen M. Brewer, D-Barre, and Reps. Anne M. Gobi, D-Spencer, and Todd M. Smola, R-Palmer, figured the town's funding was a long shot but they worked on ways to get $1 million from the state.

Ware taxpayers would contribute $1 million.

Mr. Brewer said Ware was extremely fortunate to get $5 million, with 625 applications and only six grants handed out in New England; the town of about 10,000 got $2 million more than the city of Chicago.

The town razed two vacant buildings at the site on West Street, and construction began last year. The project, Chief Coulombe said, came in on time and below budget.

Chairman of Selectmen William Braman said the new station will serve the town long into the future. He said just eight years ago the Fire Department operated two basic level ambulances.

Now there are three ambulances, two of which are equipped and staffed to provide advanced life support. Of the 18 full time firefighters, 11 are paramedics and new firefighters will be required to attain that rank.

Last year, firefighters responded to 1,770 ambulance calls along with the fire calls they answered. They are called on to perform more inspections than ever, Mr. Braman said.

Yesterday, the town decommissioned the former fire station, lowering the flag for the last time before a crowd of firefighters from Ware and other communities. The flag will be added to a time capsule that will be buried Sept. 11 at the new headquarters commissioned yesterday.

Firefighters are working from their new station and will be giving tours today and tomorrow from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

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